It is necessary to sketch in a few sentences that field of creation with which the argument from design has to do. The world presents to us four kingdoms or classes of facts. One of these, and the first in point of order, is the mineral kingdom. A few so-called elements, as metals, earthy bases, and the like, acted upon by certain forces, known to us as gravitation, motion, heat, electricity, magnetism, chemical affinity, have formed the mountain and the valley, the wind and the clouds, the sea margin and the cave; in a word, all the grand substructure on which the higher kingdoms are to take their places. Modern science has discovered however, that these physico-chemical forces are interchangeable or convertible; that retarded motion turns to heat, as in the railway break, that heat generates electricity, and the electric current magnetises the iron round which it passes. Not only this, but each force generates a certain equivalent of another—so much and no more; and no force is lost, though a force may pass from an active to a potential state. For example, two tuns of water are raised by evaporation from the sea, and one of them falls in rain in a valley drained by a river, and in its downward motion back to the sea it will turn the water-wheel, lift the tilt-hammer, bear the barge swiftly in its current, leap over the rocky ledge a foaming cataract, and in all these it is only sending back a portion of the force which was spent upon its evaporation; and the real source of all this work is, and must be, the sun's heat. And ere the water rests again in the sea it will have accounted for the whole of the force, neither less nor more, that had operated upon it; part of it in friction on its bed and in consequent heat; part of it in tasks imposed by human skill. The other tun of water shall fall into some land-locked tarn, high in the hills, where it cannot at once render back its force in work or duty, but the force is there, held in suspense or in reserve. Water lifted from the sea level to the valley of the Engadine, a mile higher, has used much of the sun's heat; it will restore that heat or some equivalent force, as soon as you make a way for it to the sea level again; and it will have parted with all the force, neither more nor less, which raised it to that height. That forces are convertible, and that whether converted or not they are conserved, so that nothing is lost, are propositions demonstrated. It is not, I believe, demonstrated, but it is a probable supposition, that all forces are but one force manifested in different modes.
Then as to the material elements on which these forces work; the hydrogen, carbon, iron, lime, and the like, the name of elements must be held to mean no more than that they have not as yet been resolved into simpler substances. Of their ultimate composition we know nothing. They may be so many modifications of an ultimate matter; but whether this ultimate matter exists, whether it be, as modern materialists tell us with such confidence, eternal and indestructible, whether impenetrability be one of its properties, whether it be not a kind of polar opposite to the physico-chemical forces, and engendered with them, so that in a different universe, with other forces at work, there must have been different elements, these are all questions of mere speculation, incapable of proof. The physical enquirer has bound himself to consider only the facts which he can observe; and when he tells us that matter is eternal, and that therefore creation is impossible, he is deserting the ground where alone he is strong. Bishop Berkeley's and Collier's denial that matter truly exists is quite as probable as this affirmation. But both alike are speculative guesses and not science.
There is a second kingdom to add to the first. The world is not a mere agglomeration of rocks and mountains, seas and lakes. Before the physical forces had completed their work, a new force had been added to them; that of life. The bare rocks became clothed with living moss. In marshy places, warm and moist, a rich vegetation grew and decayed. Along the slopes the interlacing roots of grasses detained the particles of soil which would otherwise have been washed down to some lower bed. The vegetable world, with thousands of varieties, clothed and adorned the stony earth. England's greatness in the present was taken order for in those ages when her coal measures were formed out of the forests which grew rank and died in a climate different in all respects from that which forms the subject of our daily animadversion.
Third in order comes the Animal Kingdom. I do not attempt to define life, whether animal or vegetable, with exactness. Every one has failed in that attempt. As a rough description of animal life, it may, perhaps, suffice to say that the living being is one endowed with sensation and spontaneous motion, of which each of the parts contributes something to the continuance of the whole, and is in turn preserved or defended by the whole. If those who find fault with this, look for another definition in Dr. Whewell's comprehensive work,[1] they will find my excuse in the variety and the inadequacy of the definitions there collected. The animal life spread out over the globe from the first is profuse, is beautiful and various. The oolitic limestone and the white chalk are almost wholly made up of shells of Foraminifera. On the river Columbia is a bed of clay 500 feet thick, which consists largely of the shells of Diatoms, if, indeed, these are to be ranked in the animal kingdom. The shells of the Foraminifera, which can only be examined by the microscope, exhibit wonderful variety and beauty. Still more remarkable in this respect are the Polycystina, whose shells, as figured in Mr. Ponton's book, recall censers and vases, jewelled crosses and stars, pendants and tripods, such as a London goldsmith would do well to reproduce. Until the microscope was invented no eye can have explored this wonderful dust. The shells of both these humble tribes, the Foraminifera and Polycystina resemble the shells of other animals much higher in the scale of organization; but nearly as they are related in organization to each other, the forms are very different, and each in itself presents a wonderful diversity of forms. In higher families of animals there are the same characters. The globe teems with life in earth, and air, and water. If you will permit me, so early in my argument, to speak of the Maker of them all, I will say that the creative power is inexhaustible in invention, both of useful and beautiful parts. And in the ceaseless activity of these creatures, great and small, we recognise the physical happiness which accompanies so much life. It is a chorus of thanksgiving and praise, from pool and jungle, from treetop and soft grass, from the creatures that revel in the life that God has given them.
In demanding the right to regard man as the fourth kingdom of nature, I am aware that some may demur to the claim. No doubt he must take rank in the kingdom of the animals, by reason of his identity with animals in all the vital functions. Disparaging things have been said of his brain; and Moleschott has remarked, I think, that all its finest things are but modified phosphorus after all. "No phosphorus, no thinking!" The slight projection on the outer margin of the ear has lately assumed portentous proportions. The possession of that precious relic, which has turned up suddenly like the locket of the long lost child in a stimulating novel, proves our kinship to the Simian race, from some balder specimens of which we are supposed to have descended, and gives us a place on an unsuspected family tree. But, after all that has been said by the naturalists to teach us humility, there do remain some facts, which entitle man to a separate place, to one at least of which the modern school have given greater prominence than before. They are these. Man can control nature. He can read nature and understand it. He has a power of self-regulation, which we call conscience. And he can and does think much about God.
As to the power of man to control nature, I prefer to employ the words of Mr. Wallace, one of the first to put forward what is called "the law of natural selection," who will not be suspected of claiming any transcendental place or privilege for man. "With a naked and unprotected body," he says, man's intelligence "gave him clothing against the varying inclemencies of the seasons. Though unable to compete with the deer in swiftness, or with the wild bull in strength, it has given him weapons wherewith to capture and overcome both. Though less capable than most other animals, of living on the herbs and the fruits which unaided nature supplies, this wonderful faculty taught him to govern and direct nature to his own benefit, and to make her produce food for him when and where he pleased. From the moment when the first skin was used as a covering, when the first rude spear was formed to assist in the chase, the first seed sown or root planted, a grand revolution was effected in nature, a revolution which in all the previous ages of the world had had no parallel, for a being had arisen who was no longer necessarily subject to change with the changing universe, a being who was, in some degree, superior to nature, inasmuch as he knew how to control and regulate her action, and could keep himself in harmony with her, not by a change in body, but by an advance in mind. Here, then, we see the true grandeur and dignity of man. On this view of his special attributes we may admit that even those who claim for him a position and an order a class or a sub-kingdom by himself, have some reason on their side. He is indeed a being apart, since he is not influenced by the great laws which irresistibly modify all other organic beings. Nay, more, this victory which he has gained for himself gives him a directing influence over other existences. Man has not only escaped natural selection himself, but he is actually able to take away some of that power from nature which before his appearance she universally exercised. We can anticipate the time when the earth will produce only cultivated plants and domestic animals; when man's selection shall have supplanted natural selection; and when the ocean will be the only domain in which that power can be exerted, which for countless cycles of ages ruled supreme over the earth."[2] Thus eloquently and forcibly speaks Mr. Wallace; and I do not stop now to criticise the exaggeration of language which treats the law of natural selection as supreme ruler of the earth. Let me say a few words next upon man's power to reflect on, and to understand nature. For this was the second mark by which man was distinguished from the animal creation, with which he has so much in common.
Man alone is capable of an unselfish interest in the world around him; that is, an interest that does not bear immediately on his bodily wants. How far he has carried this interest, let modern science bear witness. The common feat of foretelling all the eclipses of sun and moon for a given year, is performed for our almanack yearly, without exciting surprise or gratitude. Yet it means that man can so follow the heavenly bodies in their path, for years and years to come, for all the years that are gone, that he can tell, without fear of error, on what day the cone of shadow thrown by the sun-lighted earth into space, shall sweep over the face of the moon and blot out her light, completely or a little. But this is an old triumph, hardly worth quoting, but for its aptness to impress all kinds of minds. A clerk in one of our public offices, using only such leisure as official work allowed, has told us lately wonders about the composition of the sun; and here in London, armed with a little instrument (the spectroscope), this distinguished man has been able to ascertain that in yonder photosphere the same elements are found which the chemist seeks and finds in the crust of our little earth. What proofs can be more convincing of the fitness of man to play his part in the scene in which he is placed? His senses are adapted to the facts he is to observe; his eye to light, his ear to sonorous vibrations, his touch to resistance and to weight. But the naked organ soon falls short of his wishes. And soon the microscope unfolds the beautiful forms of the Polycystina shells, the minute fibril of the muscle, and the components of the blood of life. The telescope brings near the world of stars, and resolves the bright mist into clusters of distinct orbs. The balance weighs quantities of matter too small for the touch to appreciate. And lastly, the spectroscope takes the picture, so to speak, of chemical phenomena too distant to be realised by these means; and so the composition of the heavenly bodies, about which the most sanguine observer twenty years ago would have admitted that we should never know anything firmer than conjecture, is already the subject of exact observation.
The names of Homer, Plato, and Shakspeare remind us how marvellously the world is imaged and reproduced in the minds of some great men, and of the share which we smaller men can take in their work by an admiring sympathy. A production of art, whether literary, pictorial, or plastic, is a creation. The things of Troy were not so touching nor so grand in their reality as they became in the form which the poet gave them. Legend enters largely into the stories of Macbeth and Hamlet. The histories are shadowy, but the plays are substantial; they contain some touch of truth. Old and young read them, and lend to the author all their feelings to work on as he will. Weigh this fact well. It seems to me to show so plainly that man's constitution has been fitted by foresight and preparation for the place in earth that he was to fill.
Supposing that Moleschott was right in his startling aphorism, "Without phosphorus there is no thought," what a wonder are we forced to recognise here. The rage of Achilles, the death of Socrates, the resolute wickedness of Lady Macbeth, the character of her husband, so weak in his crime, so grand in his remorse and ruin; the refined and gentle Hamlet, forced by a preternatural command to assume the character of an avenger; to all these the presence of phosphorus in the brain is indispensable. How comes so small a cause to work such grand effects. It is sufficiently wonderful to hear Joachim discourse eloquent music upon the simplest of instruments, a violin; take away the violin and substitute a bit of wood; if the music still continues, what was before a wonderful exercise of skill is now miraculous. If great thoughts are but phosphorus burnt in the closed stove of a poet's brain, I am more ready than ever to admire that creative wisdom which could bring this out of that, which could so dispense with ordinary means in His highest productions. But the aphorism is not true as it stands. I believe there is no free phosphorus in the brain. "Without lime, no thought; without oxygen, no thought; without water, no thought." All these are true, and they import a well-known fact, that man who thinks is a creature in a material world, and that certain forms of matter are needful to his existence as an organised being.[3] "Two things are awful to me," said Kant, "the starry firmament and the sense of responsibility in man." In his "Metaphysics of Ethics" he has treated this sense of responsibility with singular logical power. It is one of the marks that separate man from all other creatures. No doubt this principle has allowed men to come to very wrong and absurd conclusions. Because the savage practises cannibalism, and knows no rules of chastity but those which flow from the husband's right of property in the wife, it is inferred that the savage has no moral sense. It would be as fair to infer that because England once traded in slaves, fought cocks, baited bulls, and oppressed the native races in India and her colonies, therefore there was no sense of right and wrong in England. It is for the existence of the principle that I contend, and not for its perfect education and enlightenment. The principle is that something is right to will and to do, and something is not right. The existence of the principle is proved if the poor savage of whom I spoke would consider his manhood disgraced by fleeing, even for his life's sake, before the foe, or by suffering one cry to escape him under the tortures, wherewith his captors are doing him to death. The education of this principle is a different matter; no one could say that even now his conscience was completely educated. "So act that your principle of action would bear to be made a law for the whole world,"[4] is a noble maxim; but it requires knowledge and light, as well as right intention. If you twit us with the fact that men have been cruel, impure, capricious, and absurd in their conduct, we answer that they had still a right and a wrong. One who has the sense of sight may find himself compelled to live in some narrow cleft or ravine, where there is little to see, but the sense is there still. The bathing-men at Pfeffers, with the earth closed almost over their heads, see little of the scenery of Switzerland: but they have eyes not the less. We are claiming for men now, not the fine sweep of moral prospect, but the moral sense of sight; and this is never wanting. Upon this sense every artifice has been used to make it look like something else;[5] for until it can be so transformed, it is a powerful witness for another world than this. The commonest explanation is that it is only a principle of enlightened self-interest. Study it for yourself in the savage, in the little child; you will find that these two principles run on different lines.
The last mark of man, that distinguishes him from all animals is, that he believes in God. One half the human race at this moment profess some creed in which God is the great first cause, the Creator and Governor of the world. Of the other half, hardly any are quite without religion. "Obliged as I am," says M. Quatrefages, in words which I have had occasion to quote elsewhere,[6] "even by my education, to pass in review the races of men, I have sought for atheism in the lowest and in the highest, but nowhere have I met with it, except in an individual, or at most in some school of men, more or less known, as we have seen in Europe in the last century, and as we see at the present day. Everywhere and always the masses of the people have escaped it." But for my present argument it is not necessary to insist that a right belief in God prevails. There is a belief in God, and it cannot have come from experience or observation of visible facts. You may lower the position of man, by comparing him to the apes, and by chemical analysis of his brain; all the more wonderful is it that a creature in such sorry case should pretend to hold communion with the divine. His feet are in the earthy clay, but his head is lifted up towards heaven. Heir to a hundred maladies, the sport of a hundred passions, holding on this life, so chequered in its complexion, but for a few days, this creature cries out of his trouble: "God exists; and he can see and hear me."